If You Give Lara a Blog

Hello, hello!  It's me, your friendly neighborhood blogger trying to get this little blog all caught up again.   

Should I blog about the amazing trip we took back in September?  Yes, yes, I should.   But my brain isn't quite there yet, so that will have to wait for another day.  

That also means that I'm not blogging about politics, my philosophy on shoes, nor an in depth look at the life cycle of bananas.  But, who am I kidding?   If I ever post anything remotely political on here, you'll know that this blog has been hacked.  It's not that I don't have strong opinions on many political issues, but I feel zero need to ever pontificate on them in public forums.  I like keeping my friends.   My philosophy on shoes may be mildly interesting to a few of you, so perhaps I'll put that in my idea list for another day far far in the future.  And don't ask me where I came up with blogging about the life cycle of a banana, but stay tuned...that might be fun.   

So what can my brain handle blogging about right now? 
 
A good go-to light topic is the weather, so perhaps we'll start there and see where it goes...

  The first part of October was quite rainy by Utah standards (something we quite enjoyed since it generally only ever drizzles here), then on Adam's birthday we woke up to snow!   Yes, I was about as happy about snow in mid-October as you can imagine, but you'll be happy to know that I didn't cry.  I may have been a little grumpy about it, but no tears were shed.  Yay me. 

Thankfully I survived and the weather has redeemed itself since then.  The last couple of weeks have been breathtakingly beautiful and I am spending as much time outside as humanly possible (which is less than I'd like).     This was a glimpse of our walk this afternoon along the Provo River Trail... 

The weather was perfection, the surroundings lovely, and the company excellent!  

We've been spending A LOT of time in Provo lately with our new calling, but the  reason why we were hiking in Provo today (instead of closer to home) was super exciting.  We had a convert baptism in our BYU ward this morning!  M. is a new freshman from the mid-west who had a lot of LDS friends in high school, which influenced her decision to attend BYU as a nonmember.  It's been an absolute delight to watch her testimony grow over the last couple months and we loved celebrating this special day with her.    I made the programs...of course!  

Last Saturday we also spent the day in Provo for another exciting, but much, much different event than a baptism....the BYU vs Utah football game.    Rather than getting season tickets for BYU football, Glen likes picking one game a season to attend and this was the one he picked.   We spent the afternoon tailgating with a bunch of Glen's work colleagues (and Adam)...

Then we headed in to watch the game, which ended exactly the way we hoped it would!   

Speaking of  excitement...I get to go play with these cutie pies soon and I'm so stinking excited I can barely stand it.   

Life has been so busy and, honestly pretty heavy lately, and I am very much looking forward to slowing down and enjoying some Lucie and Oliver time soon.   Oh, and I guess hanging out with Cam, Garrett, and Ems will be pretty awesome too.  

That's all I have for now, but before I sign off for the night, let me leave you with a glimpse at the glorious sunrise this morning.    

It made our entire room glow and it was a beautiful start to a beautiful day.   

Have a wonderful week!  💗

Your Mom is Weird

Letter written to our missionary:  4/17/23

************************
Hello dear missionary of mine!  
How's life in  the land of Ports and Dams?   How fun that I still get to make  Dam jokes with you even in your new area.   You probably thought you would get to escape those eventually, but...NOT YET! 

I'm fully aware that my obsession with beavers/dams probably puts me squarely in the "weird category", but I'm okay with that.  At least I'm not also obsessed with sending stupid little 4x6 pieces of thick paper in the mail, because that would be truly weird.  

Oh wait.  Never mind.

I do also send doughnuts to your cousins who have birthdays...

Maybe that makes me slightly more normal...

I also seem to have an issue with dogs following me home...

For approximately the 5th time since moving to Utah, we met a loose dog on our morning walk and had it follow us all the way home.     He had no tag/collar on, so we posted on the community FB page and pretty quickly found the owner to Maverick.  He was a pretty sweet guy, but we laughed that this never once happened while we lived in VA or PA, but somehow it happens on a semi-regular basis here in UT!   Maybe we smell extra meaty or something now.  

I also can't stop looking for "matching" pictures to show Cami after she sends me a  picture of Lucie.  She sent me this one to show how Lucie was wiping her hands in her hair like a napkin, so I found one of Cami doing the same thing...then found one of me doing the same thing.  In other words, apparently messy eating runs in the family!  

I guess it might be  slightly weird that I've started looking for "wishing rocks" to show your little cousins after I read them a cute picture book during Spring Break about different types of rocks you can find.   It gave me Adam vibes to be walking along the trail with a pocket full of rocks...and to now have a pile of rocks on my windowsill for whatever future date we might see the King Boys again. 

On Sunday, we decided to channel our inner Adam even further and took an afternoon drive to Bear River Bird Refuge.   It was a lovely day and I had fun using the Merlin App (an amazing discovery) to help us identify some of  the different birds. 

We saw American avocets...

A snowy egret (we didn't need the app for this one)...

An American coot...

A yellow-headed blackbird...

 American white pelicans...

A white faced ibis...

And some hungry Gooldicus Birdicus... {there were too many bugs to eat our picnic outside}.  We definitely need to take you there when you get home.  You would love this place!  

Also, on a different, but related note...Spring is kind of here and I've stopped crying every morning when I see the weather forecast...I also am enjoying post-dinner walks a few times a week.   {PS  I only joined BeReal to be friends with your sisters and the three of them are literally the ONLY friends I have on there (not that they post very often or anything).   Someone else tries to add me and they are instantly and cruelly denied! I will probably let you be my friend in 15ish months or so though, so don't worry.}

In case you're wondering why I only said Spring was "kind-of here"...

There are still way too many cold days in the mix for my taste...not that I'm complaining too much.  I am definitely reveling in the sunshine and not having to wear my woolen outerwear every day for now, but, heaven help me,  if it snows on my birthday, there won't  be enough beavers in the world to justify the  torrent of dams that will flow forth from my mouth. 

Sorry. 

I guess I better go read my scriptures  or something {I'M ON MORONI 9, SO ONE MORE DAY!!!}.   Or maybe send a few postcards.  Or think of a spiritual thought to end with...

Here's a quote in President Nelson's GC talk that stood out to me:  

"The Savior’s message is clear: His true disciples build, lift, encourage, persuade, and inspire—no matter how difficult the situation. True disciples of Jesus Christ are peacemakers."

It made me think of you and the other missionaries out there making the world a better place and it made me thoughtful about what I could do to be a better peacemaker.  

I hope you have an amazing week!  We can't wait to talk with you tomorrow! 

LOVE YOU!!!!
Love,
Mom

 




 

A Weekend in March

My life with my kids all grown up is decidedly not very exciting, however I feel like it's still fun to look back at the happenings of our lives, whatever stage we happened to be in.   Here's a look at the first weekend in March at our house along with a little life update at the end....

FRIDAY:  I very much look forward to Facetiming with Lucie and Cami as often as they have time for it.   Lucie is very interactive on the phone and it makes me incredibly happy to be able to have conversations with her and feel a connection, despite living across the country from each other.  This screenshot was from a silly moment when  Lucie and I were showing off our sunglasses to each other.   

SATURDAY:  We took a 5 mile hike into Provo Canyon, while Ellie and Emma spent the morning together in Provo.  There was a strong headwind, which made it verrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrry cold!   Denali hurt her foot and had to be carried for a few minutes, then we let her off leash and she had no trouble the rest of the way back to the car.  She is definitely a bit of a diva!

SATURDAY:   I'm getting more and more done with winter by the day, so I put up my spring decor, so at least I can pretend spring is almost here when I'm inside the house.   

A glimpse of my new Easter wreath, which I will keep indoors for another couple weeks in hopes that it doesn't get snowed on...

SATURDAY:  Made and printed a flier for the RS Birthday celebration this week.  At the point of writing this post (before it happens), I am feeling quite stressed about it! 

UPDATE:  It was the activity that has taken the most time and effort and is the one that the fewest people have attended.  Execution went smoothly, but it still sort of feels like a bust. 

Got half-way through a book before realizing that I read it several years ago.  That rating on Goodreads was my rating from 15-years ago and I didn't like it any better this time around.   It was the 8th book I've read in 2023. 

Also....Ellie, Emma, and Glen met at a theater to watch the new AntMan.   I opted to stay home and get some things crossed off my list. 

Also...Spencer is in Virginia visiting old friends for a few days, so we are on triple dog duty, which means I have had a triple shadow following me around all weekend!   Kiwi will be very very happy when he gets home.  

SUNDAY:    Glen smoked chicken for dinner and I may have gotten a little carried away with the sides.... #fastsundayproblems

Besides the smoked chicken, we had lemon brussels sprouts, kale salad, mashed cauliflower, and a low-carb zucchini/cheese bread.  Ellie made some flourless peanut butter cookies made with coconut sugar.  It was exceedingly delicious! 

ALSO SUNDAY:  Got a text from a good friend (Jen B.), who said she'd just gotten this text from her friend in Oregon, where Adam and his companion had just had dinner.  It made me smile! 

MONDAY MORNING:   It's not really the weekend anymore, but I couldn't resist throwing on one more picture from our morning walk, which  left me with snow on my nose and eyelashes.  I literally cried  a few minutes after this picture was taken when I saw a friend's post about the  cherry blossoms in Virginia.  #notoneofmyfavoritethings

  I'll be honest, my perspective on life has been pretty down and discouraged lately.  I am quite tired of the winter, I still haven't found closure with the stressful incident that happened with my calling (ie she still won't talk to me), I'm worried about being in transition again with Glen's job, and I haven't felt like I've fit in somewhere for a very long time (basically since leaving Virginia).  I know my life is very blessed and I really am trying to embrace the good, but I miss feeling known/liked/wanted.   

Here's rooting for brighter {and warmer} days ahead!  

Ten Things That Made Me Smile Last Week

 In no particular order, here are 10 things that made me smile this past week...

10.  A "dam" surprise!   One morning I was taking a drink out of my water bottle when the kids started making snarky comments about it.   I was confused until I looked down and found a  sticker with strong Lara-humor-vibes sticking to it.   It took me a second to figure out how it had gotten there overnight, then I remembered a visit from my sister, Heather, the night before and I didn't have to wonder any longer!   😀

9 . The sun started shining again!    We went through a couple weeks of very un-Utah-like  days of endless clouds.   It was cold and dreary and every day it would rain or snow a bit more.    It's still cloudier than usual for Utah, but  we've definitely seen the sun a bit more this week and it's made me very happy!  

8.  Letters from our missionary.  We take great pride at making sure our missionaries are the mail receiving  champions of their missions, but we know missionary life means they don't have time to actually write back all that often.   This week we were surprised with snail mail letters from Adam....something that made us all smile big!  

7. A full row of girls {+Glen} at church!   Emma had to run to her ward after sacrament meeting, but I loved having the whole G Girl crew for the first hour of church.   I miss people knowing my older kids.    

6. Lucie snuggles.  She's not actually much of a snuggler normally, but there were a few times when I happened to be taking care of her when she was a bit on the tired side, that I got to enjoy some sleepy snuggly moments!  I loved every second of it. 

5.  Finding a way to share!     I started making the Come, Follow Me activity sheets again this year and worried because I didn't really have a good forum for sharing them, since my FHE blog isn't all that well-used anymore and our current ward doesn't do paper programs.   Then I remembered that I had an email list from a few years ago.  I sent out a note and got about 15 people who indicated they were interested in receiving them by email once a month.   I was very excited, because I enjoy making them and I enjoy the opportunity it gives me to dive in and study each week's reading with more purpose and depth, but I also like knowing that they're being appreciated. 

4. Lucie dances!   Lucie is a girl who can dance before she can walk!   She's got rhythm and moves and it's hard not to get in on the dancing with Lucie leading the way. This week we introduced her to "Baby Shark" and, much to Cami's chagrin, she's now a fan!   She even figured out a way to ask for it by signing, "more," and then saying "dance" or doing the baby shark action.   {sorry, I can't figure out how to embed it, but here's the link if you want to watch a video of her dancing, though now I need to video her dancing to Baby Shark}

3.  Healing well!  I went to my post-op doctor appointment and was declared to be healing well!    I can start introducing more intense  physical activities in about 2 weeks. 

2. A nice comment on my FHE blog.  I know that my blogging habits (and the reasons why I have spent so much time on them over the years) is inexplicable to most people, but suffice it to say, it was NOT to garner attention or feedback.   Having said that though, there really isn't anything more satisfying than  when I get a nice comment on something I spent many hours on.  The particular blogpost {that I got a comment on} was one that I put a lot of thought, prayer, and heart into several years ago.   In real life, it was completely ignored and got zero feedback,  so getting the occasional pat on the back, a handful of times in the 7 years since sharing it, is extremely heartwarming to me.   I'll be honest, it feels like I was led to create that blogpost more for the online world than for my own ward.    

1.  Cami and Lucie being here!    It's been an absolute delight to have Cami and Lucie here for the last week and it's going to feel awfully lonely around here now.    

Honorable mentions.  To close off this blogpost, here are a few honorable mentions that are making me smile this week...

We ordered some caramel apples from our favorite ice cream shop in Pennsylvania!   We would have loved to have ordered ice cream as well, but we'll take what we can get! 

I taught Lucie how to say, "Baaaaa," when asked what a sheep says and I am very excited!   

 

We got Lucie this little puffer suit for Christmas and it made me smile to have her try it out on a walk the other day.  

Emma is fully entrenched in her life at BYU, so she's only been able to come home a couple times while Cami's been here, but I love that she's close enough that Cami and her can still hang out while she's here.  

What's making you smile this week?